The Verve Vinyl, CD & tapes from this artist at Norman Records

Starting out as Verve (until the jazz label of the same name had a word), The Verve stumbled through a career of quite astonishing highs and lows - from the worldwide success of Urban Hymns (with it's ubiquitous Stones-sampling Bittersweet Symphony)...read more »

Starting out as Verve (until the jazz label of the same name had a word), The Verve stumbled through a career of quite astonishing highs and lows - from the worldwide success of Urban Hymns (with it's ubiquitous Stones-sampling Bittersweet Symphony) to mental illness, breakdowns, three break ups, and most punishingly of all the preening disaster that was Richard Ashcroft's solo career.

Their first album 'A Storm In Heaven' is a swirling, dream-like affair with nods to Pink Floyd, and fits in beautifully with the shoegaze sound of the day. It's follow up 'A Northern Soul' was less successful. A dirge-like album of tortured soul, it reflected the state of the band at the time as Ashcroft suffered a relationship breakdown and drug-induced burn out. The album, though, was a bit of a slow-burning classic in some quarters and led the band to have the re-think that produced their most well known work. Urban Hymns spawned several hits including 'Sonnet', 'The Drugs Don't Work', 'Lucky Man' and of course 'Bittersweet Symphony' (used to this day as the intro music for England football matches). It's easy to sniff at these lad-friendly anthems, full of sentimental Northern British bombast, but listen to them on a good day and you will get caught up despite yourself.

Of course nothing is straightforward in the world of The Verve, and the band then broke up seemingly for good before reconvening in 2008 for an aptly titled album 'Forth' before splitting again. Richard Ashcroft has dabbled in a comical solo career whilst guitarist Simon Tong appeared with Damon Albarn in The Good The Bad and the Queen.

Richard Ashcroft, as you probably know, was the lead singer with The Verve. Alone With Everybody was his debut solo album, and moved Ashcroft even further away from The Verve’s early shoegazing sound. It was very popular with people who like this kind of thing upon its release in 2000. Chris Marti...view item »

I mean... will you just look at him. This 'natural rebel' was of course best known for being the frontman of the Verve until they multi imploded. "My strongest set of songs to date" says Ashcroft about his latest collection. Not a hard achievement I suppose given the quality (or lack of) seen in his solo career to date. So...view item »

This 1995 album brought 3 huge singles - This Is Music, On Your Own and History, But you lot want more? Well it is now remastered and presented with all of the B-sides for each individual release as well as early versions of songs, unreleased studio tracks, live sessions and interviews. Good enough?...view item »

Debut album from The Verve (back when they were just 'Verve"), remastered and piled in with a tonne of ridiculous goodies. Including all the tracks from their EPs before the album, two radio sessions, acoustic versions, a DVD of live and studio videos and even two unreleased studio tracks – South Pacific...view item »

20 years since this much loved album which spawned a handful of classic hits such as 'Bittersweet Symphony', 'The Drugs Don't Work' and 'Lucky Man' was issued and...you guessed it...it's time for the lavish remastered version in a series of formats including a super 6LP or 5CD box set with acres of live tracks and B sides. ...view item »

When The Verve announced they were reforming I dared hope that they might surprise us all and come back doing something like the amazing shoegazey psychedelia of the first LP or at the very least the mint but more pedestrian sounding stuff on A Northern Soul. This was obviously about 91% hope, 8% insanity and 1% expectation. Their new single's h...view item »

Most "reunion" albums are disappointing and many are downright terrible. Verve breaks the trend by offering 10 tracks that range from good to great. Most tracks are closer to "good," but there's no denying that this CD stands fine along side with Verve's 3 others from the '90s. If anything the tracks we get this time are more akin to their first...view item »

When The Verve announced they were reforming I dared hope that they might surprise us all and come back doing something like the amazing shoegazey psychedelia of the first LP or at the very least the mint but more pedestrian sounding stuff on A Northern Soul. This was obviously about 91% hope, 8% insanity and 1% expectation. Their new sing...view item »

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